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 Do You Love Me?
by Ray Starks, 2/1/04
Printer-Friendly Version 
Just look around any retail store and you can easily tell what month it is—February, the “love season.” Everywhere you look there are hearts, candy, cupids and other trinkets to give that significant someone in your life. When we see the displays we are reminded and somehow feel obligated to do something special for our sweetie. But really, it’s just another retail shot-in-the-arm gimmick during a traditional slow-sales time of the year. No one really cares if it increases your love or not.
Jesus, on the other hand is very concerned about love and our response to it. He didn’t go about giving valentines or candy and hugging up on people to show His love for others; instead He chose to model His love in a more dramatic fashion—He loved with His life. He gave Himself by hanging on a tree.
Jesus always was a man of action.
- He didn’t just talk about things like love— He lived and modeled them.
- He didn’t have seasons when He showed His love and times when He didn’t—He lived love constantly.
- He didn’t rely on external things to prompt Him to love us (things like our merit or beauty or behavior)—He loved us while we were yet sinners.
- He didn’t love only the popular—His love was extended to every social stratum known to society.
- He didn’t set a limit on how much He would love us—He gave everything He could give; even His life.
Real love. Sacrificial love. That’s Jesus’ standard for us. He has set the pace. He has raised the bar. He has hung the target way off. He is not only showing us the way to really love each other—He is challenging us to follow His lead, as His disciples. To love—not conditionally, not occasionally, not conveniently, not sparingly—but sacrificially with our lives.
Jesus is saying, “Do you love Me? Prove it by the way you love others!”
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